


Boys Will Be Boys

by MadAndy



Category: Edguy (Band)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-10
Updated: 2016-04-10
Packaged: 2018-06-01 11:30:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6516739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MadAndy/pseuds/MadAndy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tobi just...was. And none of them would change him for the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Boys Will Be Boys

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Although this tale features characters that share an awful lot of characteristics with the individuals who go to make up the featured rock band, it isn't them. I'm fully aware of that fact; they're completely their own people, and this is a fantasy based on their stage personas, interviews and other material in the public domain. No malice or impeachment is intended to the band, their families, friends, management companies or anyone else involved with them in any way, shape or form. No money is being made from this tale, it's written purely for the enjoyment of the author...and her readers. 
> 
> It's fiction. Enjoy it as such.

****

_Boys Will Be Boys_

It was the commotion next door that woke Felix.

No voices that he could recognise, but several muffled thuds, the sound of glass shattering; now that he was awake and listening more closely he could hear that there were voices, but they were even more muffled than the thumps. One in particular caught his attention; higher, sharper than the others, and all too familiar.

Tobi.

In trouble again, from the sounds of it.

Felix blinked the last of the sleep from his eyes, and swung his legs over the side of the bed. Between Eggi’s rasped snores he could hear muttering from next door, the violence shaded to nothing for now. He even wondered if he was imagining it; perhaps he’d just heard particularly enthusiastic--

Tobi’s voice again, but this time he could hear the words - albeit faintly. _No, don’t!_

OK, that was it. And if it turned out that he was interrupting needlessly then he’d kick Tobi’s backside himself. Halfway through the fucking tour, stuck in this grubby little hotel in the middle of Bumfuck, USA, and their stupid frontman and his endless blasted libido--

Another yelp from Tobi got him moving, and he grabbed Eggi’s shoulder to shake him awake. 

“Nnnnf...wha...?”

“Eggi! Wake up!”

“Mmmrrrrrrhhhhnnnn...go ‘way, Felix.”

This time the crash was loud enough to bring even the sleepy bassist upright, and he blinked startled eyes in the darkness.

“The fuck?”

“Exactly! Come on, get _up_.”

By the time Eggi had thrown on a pair of jeans, Felix was practically dancing at the door with agitation. The noises from next door came and went in sporadic bursts; Tobi had been heard to yelp another couple of times, and if Eggi didn’t get his arse in gear Felix was going to burst in alone. Which, considering that he’d managed to identify at least three voices from the other room, might not be the cleverest decision he’d ever made.

“OK,” said Eggi, and Felix shook his head. They didn’t exactly look that terrifying.

Crunch from the other side of the wall, and both men forgot all about their own shortcomings and shot out into the corridor. That one had sounded _nasty_. 

There was a guy out there, lounged by the door - little more than a kid, really - and Felix got no more than an impression of wide, dark eyes and killer cheekbones above a cloud of cigarette smoke before the kid took to his heels. Eggi stared after him, scratched his head; Felix, on the other hand, saw that the door wasn’t fully latched, and kicked it open.

Tobi was indeed in trouble.

He was crouched behind the overturned bed, and some hulking great bastard was making an attempt to drag him out by the scruff of the neck. Another man was sifting through his belongings, suitcase overturned, wallet ripped apart, books and clothes scattered all over the trashed room.

“What the fuck is going on here?” yelled Felix, as loudly as he could. He hoped like hell there was an element of menace in his voice as well, because that one trying to drag Tobi out from behind the bed was one _big_ motherfucker.

Eggi shouldered his way into the room, a scowl etched on his usually amiable features. “The fuck?” he snapped, and the one rifling through Tobi’s belongings began to look uneasy as their numbers were matched. The tall drummer stalked further in and seized the first piece of wood that came to hand, which happened to be all that remained of the desk chair. It was too awkward to make an effective weapon, but he brandished it anyway.

Eggi stuck close to Felix, and began to snarl in German; Felix had to try not to smile, because in actual fact his friend was begging the bad guys not to hurt them. From the confused expressions, however, neither of the intruders spoke the language. Fortunately.

More crashing, and Dirk arrived with Jens hard on his heels. Jens’ voice could be heard complaining bitterly about disturbed sleep, and what the fuck was going on at this time of night and...?

At least Dirk had thought to bring a weapon. He’d bought a baseball bat as a gift for a nephew back home, and he came through the door swinging it like a man who knew exactly what he was doing.

The guy sorting through Tobi’s belongings tried to flee, but Felix grabbed him by the collar, shoved him up against the wall; he bared his teeth in a growl, tuned out Eggi’s threatening blather in his ear. He’d progressed to explaining the drinks licensing laws in their home town, and he was going to find himself eating the damn chair leg himself in a minute if he didn’t shut _up_.

Tobi’s attacker lunged for them, and Dirk placed himself squarely in his way; Jens - useful as ever - took one look over Dirk’s shoulder and yelped.

“Call the police,” snapped Felix, but Tobi staggered to his feet, waved his hands in alarm.

“No no no no! it’s all been a misunderstanding - let them go, Felix. Dirk! Put the bat down!”

Felix took a long, long look at his friend. One eye blackened, cheek swelling rapidly; if his nose wasn’t broken it was doing a damn fine impression, and from the way he was clutching at his ribs they would need looking at too. He was, in short, a mess. But he wanted them released, so--

“Fine,” he snapped, and stepped back. The man he’d had pinned to the wall - shorter than he, shifty eyed and grubby - straightened his collar, shot Felix a wink and slunk away. The other one glanced over his shoulder at Tobi and snorted, disgust colouring his tone.

“You,” he snapped, voice of whiskey and gravel, “leave town. Don’t come back.” He cocked his head at the others. “And that goes for your fairies here, too.”

With that, he shouldered past the other men and stalked away down the corridor, the door at the end closing behind him with a loud slam.

“I’m not a fairy,” said Eggi, into the sudden silence of the room. “What about you, Jens? Any wings?”

“Shut up, Eggi,” grumbled Felix, and while the other three crowded into the wrecked room he went to see what had been done to Tobi.

~*~

Tobi fidgeted on the toilet seat, and whined in the back of his throat when Felix applied antiseptic to the worst of the scrapes.

“Shut up. What the fuck happened in here, anyway?”

Tobi looked away, which drew a sigh from his friend. The occasional bump and snigger from the other room was Jens and Dirk straightening the room - as much as they could; the damage was extensive, and their tour manager would no doubt have a sense of humour failure of colossal proportions when he got the bill. Eggi’s voice was a babble from the corridor; the receptionist had come running when some other guests had complained about the fighting going on, and despite the urging from his band Tobi was insistent upon no police, no intervention by anyone. They would deal with it, he said.

So Eggi was running interference with the hotel staff - it was his boyish charm, they’d told him when he objected - and the other two were making right what they could. And in the bathroom Felix was trying, with the aid of a basic first aid kit and holding his temper in with an effort, to deal with Tobi.

“Tobi--”

“Don’t be such a worrier, Felix. It was nothing.”

Perched on the side of the bath, Felix ran some extra antiseptic onto the cloth and slapped it, none too gently, on Tobi’s abraded shoulder.

“Ow!”

“Talk, Tobias.”

Eggi’s broad, good natured face appeared round the bathroom door, and Tobi’s sigh of relief was not missed by Felix. If he had anything to say about it the relief was going to be very short lived indeed.

“All quiet out here. Dirk and Jens have finished and gone to bed - they say you’re an idiot, Sammet - so is there anything else you need?”

“Ice,” said Felix. “Bucket should be out there somewhere, machine down the corridor.”

“But Felix--!”

The glare that nailed him had Eggi trailing off down the corridor, ice bucket clanking against his thigh, complaints uttered under his breath drifting back to them along the night quiet of the hotel corridor. Felix turned back to eye Tobi, his expression severe, freshly soaked pad in his hand and intention to use it writ large on his face.

“Talk.”

Tobi sagged a bit.

“There was this guy--”

“The one outside the room? The kid?”

“He said he was twenty one!”

Felix sighed. That was Tobi for you; the ultimate triumph of enthusiasm over good sense. God, how often had they played this scenario out, in how many countries, how many tours?

One day it was going to end badly.

“So you got talking - right? - and invited him back to the hotel.”

Tobi scuffed his bare feet against the tiled floor.

“Well. Yes.”

Eggi returned, thrust the ice bucket at Felix, and announced that he’d had enough and was going to bed. “And if you’ve got any sense, Bohnke,” he added, expression unusually severe, “you’ll come too and leave this idiot to sort out his own mess!”

The slam of Tobi’s door was loud enough to make both men flinch. The expression turned on Felix was enough to make the drummer smile, despite everything; a kicked spaniel puppy had nothing on Tobi when he knew he’d been bad. If he’d had longer ears they would have drooped, and the mangled nose only added to the overall woebegone expression.

“He’s really pissed off with me, isn’t he?”

Felix took his time, rolled some ice into a towel and pressed it gently over the swollen cheek and eye. “Here, hold that. It’ll take the swelling off. And yeah, a bit. Disappointed, mostly; so you invited him back to the hotel, right? At what point did the goons show up?”

“He made a phone call - said he had to tell some friends he was going to be late.”

“Right.”

“And then when these two guys followed us in from the car park I didn’t think anything of it--”

“To- _bi_....”

“--and we’d just got started, you know, and there was a knock on the door and he went to answer it. He said it was room service--”

A huge sigh crawled up from somewhere around the soles of Felix’ feet, shuddered up his legs and tied his ribs in a knot before making its escape to stir the hairs on the arm he was attempting to bandage. Just like Tobi. He would have been surprised when the men started to beat the shit out of him and trash the room; it never, ever occurred to him that anyone could be other than they at first appeared.

“You’re cross with me, aren’t you?”

He didn’t answer for a moment, just poked gentle fingers at the reddening area across his friend’s side. “Tobi, these could be broken. You should go to a hospital--”

“No!”

They looked at each other, and it was Tobi dropped his gaze first. He was so miserable; it wasn’t the fact that he’d been robbed, beaten, and taken for an idiot that had upset him, no. It was the fact that his band, his friends, his brothers, thought that he was an insufferable idiot that hurt him. The rest he would cheerfully wave off as one of those things, but Eggi’s parting shot had hurt.

“You’re an idiot, Sammet.”

Tobi flinched at the words, delivered as they were on a long-suffering sigh.

Felix couldn’t help it, and leaned closer to wrap long arms around his friend - gently, bearing in mind the bruises and scrapes - and sighed deeply into the thinning hair. He’d never learn, but then, that was why Tobi was...Tobi.

The small man in his arms trembled, and Felix knew he needed some rest. Tomorrow they got on the bus, left this shitty little town behind; he’d have all day to persuade him to go and get his scrapes and bruises attended to, but right now--

“Come on. You need to go to bed.”

The eyes that turned up to him were frightened, although at the raised eyebrow he fought down the first reaction and tried to look calm and assured. 

Felix rolled his eyes, and Tobi laughed under his breath, a laugh that turned to little gasp of pain when he got up.

“Will you stay?”

“Tobi--”

“Oh come on. Just until morning?”

He was going to lose this argument. Felix knew that even as he opened his mouth to argue, and then Tobi laid his head on his chest and fluttered his eyelashes, the outrageousness of the gesture guaranteed to make his friend laugh. And as soon as he laughed, Tobi had won - and knew it.

“Christ. Fine, go on then....”

The bedside lamp was broken, so once Tobi had made himself a nest in the rumpled blankets Felix had to use the main switch to darken the room. Lit only by the yellow sodium glare of the lamps in the car park that striped across the wrecked room he picked his way to the bed, folded his long frame next to Tobi’s. He wasn’t surprised when his friend curled into his side, nestled his head into his chest and murmured a quit ‘g’night’; still smelling the antiseptic, Felix rumpled Tobi’s hair and sighed ruefully.

Even as sleep began to creep up on him he found himself wondering if Tobi would ever grow up, or if the rest of them would be forever looking after him, in one way or another; a snort through a bruised nose, a whisper of air across his chest, and he decided it didn’t matter.

Tobi just... _was_. And none of them would change him for the world.

_~Fin~_


End file.
